CHANGE IN CABLE TV LAW STUDIED

Members of Palm Beach County's Cable Television Task Force failed again Friday to resolve differences over access to private property, the major stumbling block in the development of a new regulatory ordinance.

The task force is tentatively scheduled to recommend either the adoption of a completed new ordinance or the use of the existing law at a County Commission workshop on April 21.

But the question of prohibiting public cable companies from going into developments or condominium complexes that are served by their own private system continued to plague the group.

A proposed ordinance, developed by a team of consultants hired by the county to work with the task force, declares that cable companies may have full access to all buildings and developments in the county. That proposal guarantees the property owner compensation for the use of property by cable easements, lines and equipment.

According to the consultants' report, there are 18 developments in Palm Beach County that have such systems. Under federal rules, they are exempted from local government regulation as long as lines do not cross any public right of ways.

Task Force member John Perry of Perry Cable maintained this restriction gave no assurance residents receiving those systems would have the same access to cable viewing, particularly with the advent of local access programming.

The ordinance also was flawed, he said, in that it made no provision for services to planned-unit developments where the lands are owned by a developer, or to developments where common grounds are controlled by homeowners' associations.

Because of this vague wording, he said, there are enough loopholes to make any prohibitions practically worthless.

"There are so many holes," he said, "that anybody that sits down and puts in three hours of thought can come up with so many ways to get around it."

Developer Jay Hasner, however, said the restriction may be the only way to assure residents in private developments of getting the type of cable service they want.

"The idea is not to protect everything for the (cable) operator," he said. "The idea is to bring cable to the consumer."

The issue may eventually rest with court cases on equal access which are pending in other areas of the country, said Assistant County Attorney Chip Carlson, who agreed to look at current case law and at state legislation being proposed by the Florida cable industry to see if acceptable language on equal access could be developed.

Either way, task force members indicated, there is likely to be a court challenge.

Perry also criticized provisions in the proposed ordinance on theft of services, saying it was weaker than model legislation developed on the federal level. Like existing state law, he said, it did nothing to prohibit the sale of cable theft devices on the open market.